France prepares for a massive mobilisation on April 4

After President Chirac’s intervention
and the refusal of the government to back down, the only way to
defeat the CPE is for an all out mobilisation of the working class
for a 24-hour general strike to bring down the government.

The national day of action of March 28
marked a new peak in the two-month long mobilisation of French youth
and workers against the hated CPE. The CPE, First Employment
Contract, is a new type of contract for young people which, with the
excuse of “encouraging the hiring of young workers”, strips them
of even the most basic employment rights. Anyone under this kind of
contract can be sacked during a two-year trial period and the
employer does not even have to give a reason.

Some three million workers and students
participated in demonstrations all over France on March 28. Workers
went on strike paralysing public transport, schools and universities,
the media, the postal service, etc. In the private sector the strike
was not as big, but nevertheless the CGT Metal workers federation
reported that more than 1000 large factories had participated in the
strike. The fact that the trade union leaders did not actually call
for a general strike, but rather a “day of strikes and work
stoppages” did not help in bringing out workers in the private
sector where the levels of trade union membership are lower and fear
of reprisals bigger.

The massive character of the movement,
which in terms of numbers in the demonstrations was even larger than
the peak of the 1995 strikes against the Juppé Plan, widened
the divisions amongst the ruling class and the ruling right-wing UMP
party. Interior Minister Sarkozy made public his disagreement with
Prime Minister de Villepin. It is not that Sarkozy is somehow more
“progressive” or more “reasonable” than de Villepin. He is
the man in charge of the repression against the revolt of the
unemployed youth of the banlieues at the end of last year, and
of the police provocations against the demonstrations in the current
movement.

What explains Sarkozy’s position is
on the one hand his attempt to win the position of right-wing
candidate for next year’s presidential elections. On the other
hand, he represents that wing of the ruling class which is starting
to wonder whether it is worth risking a revolutionary explosion over
a contract which would be in any case withdrawn in the likely event
of a Socialist Party victory in 2007.

In the aftermath of the impressive
demonstrations and strikes of March 28 the students continued their
movement unabated. The mass general assemblies in schools and
universities, which have given the movement an organised expression,
decided on a number of local actions. Thursday March 30
saw thousands of students blockading roads and occupying key train
stations all over the country. In Paris, at least 2,000 students
occupied the Gare de Lyon train station, and trade union activists
from SUD- Rail and CGT came out in support.

The day before, Education Minister de
Robien had called for blockaded high schools to be reopened “by
force if necessary”. Police officers were present in a number of
schools but did not manage to lift the blockades. Meanwhile, hundreds
of students were questioned and arrested by the police trying to
clear road blockades. Among those arrested was Karl Stoekl, president
of the UNL (National School Students), one of two main school student
organisations, who was arrested by police during a blockade of
Paris’s circular road periphery.

On the same day the Constitutional
Committee ruled that the new law “for equality of opportunities”,
which includes the hated CPE amongst other measures, was
constitutional. This was a legal pre-requisite which meant all that
was needed for the law to come into being was the approval of
President Chirac. He was scheduled to make a speech to the nation
explaining his position on Friday at 8:00 pm.

The student organisations called for
rallies in the main squares of the cities to listen to Chirac’s
speech and give a clear answer. Despite the fact that these rallies
were organised on the same day by word of mouth, hundreds came out to
listen to the presidential speech, as they had done in 1968.

Chirac tried to appear reasonable and
willing to negotiate but ended up in a legal mess. He said he agreed
that the law should be put into practice, but appealed to the
employers not to make use of it (!!!), while parliament discussed a
new law which would introduce two modifications to the CPE. The
modifications are that the trial period lasts only for one year
(instead of two), and that the employers must give a reason for
sacking workers under the CPE (though this reason could be anything
and workers would not be able to appeal it). The main aim of Chirac
was in fact to reunite the ranks of the UMP, where an ever-larger
number of MPs were questioning whether going ahead with this contract
was really wise.

The reaction of the thousands of people
who had gathered to listen to the speech was immediate: these
“concessions” were received as a farce. In Paris the rally grew
from a few hundred to an angry crowd of more than 5000 people who
marched through the streets of the capital until late at night. An
opinion poll the day after showed 62% of the population was “not
convinced” by Chirac’s speech against only 27% “convinced” by
it.

The trade union and student leaders
remained firm and announced they would not negotiate with the
government unless the CPE was withdrawn. On Saturday, April 1,
at a meeting of the national coordination of university and school
students, 800 representatives elected at the general assemblies,
decided to continue the struggle, confirmed the appeal for the April
4 day of action, and issued a call for a general strike.

The appeal for April 4 on the part of
the trade union and student organisation leaders is in fact worded
exactly in the same way as that for March 28: “to widen the
struggle … a national day of action with strikes, work stoppages
and demonstrations”. Many in the movement think, particularly after
the success of March 28, that this is not enough and that what is
required is a clear call for a 24-hour general strike, at the very
least. In fact the trade union leaders are afraid that a general
strike, if called, might not be limited to 24 hours, but become the
beginning of an all out movement which would escape their control.

There is already a tradition of that
kind of movement in France, going back to 1968, but also during the
1995/96 strikes of public sector workers and the 2003 movement
against the pension reform. An FO leader explained it clearly when he
said that calling for a general strike would have “insurrectionary
connotations”.

By not giving a clear lead, the trade
union leadership makes it more difficult for workers in the less
organised and less secure jobs in the private sector to come out on
strike, and then they can always turn around and say: “see, we told
you, there were no conditions for a general strike, we called on
everybody to strike but they did not come out”.

The struggle is now at a critical
juncture. Some of the universities and schools have been occupied for
nearly two months. Students are on the verge of losing a whole school
or university year. After this coming week we have the beginning of
Easter holidays for school students. The government is banking on the
movement becoming tired and progressively dying out. They also expect
to convince some of the more moderate union leaders, the CFDT leaders
for instance, to negotiate and thus divide the movement. Already some
union leaders are hinting that they would be prepared to meet and
negotiate with the government even if it does not withdraw the CPE.
Much will depend on what happens on April 4and the days
immediately afterwards.

The day of action is likely to be even
bigger than that of March 28, but the role of the working class is
crucial. If the unions are not prepared to call for a proper general
strike, the rank and file activists must make April 4a de
facto general strike. As the comrades from La Riposte are
arguing, the main forces of the students’ movement (which has been
so far at the vanguard of this movement) must be directed towards the
workplaces with mass leafleting, discussions, joint meetings and
establishing solid links with shop stewards and trade union
activists.

Committees should be established in
each district, locality, region and at a national level to ensure the
success of April 4 and the continuation of the movement. The basis
for such bodies already exists in the coordination of student
delegates elected at the general assemblies and the inter-trade union
committees that are already operating in many cities. It is essential
that these committees are enlarged to involved all sections of the
movement (public and private sector workers, school and university
students) and to ensure that they work on the basis of elected and
recallable delegates accountable to workplace, school and university
general assemblies.

Such a democratic and flexible
structure would ensure the necessary rapid response of the movement
to what happens after April 4. General assemblies should be called in
all schools, universities and workplaces on the morning of April 5 to
make a balance-sheet of the movement on the previous day and to
decide whether to continue the strike or not.

The events of the last few weeks in
France must be seen against the background of 10 years of massive
mobilisation after massive mobilisation. The French workers and youth
have fought courageously against all the attempts to reverse rights
and conditions that had been won over a long period of time. Since
1995 they have gone through the school of struggle and have learnt a
lot. Thus accumulation of experience, and the seriousness of the
crisis of French capitalism have prepared the conditions for a
revolutionary explosion in France of a scope similar to that of May
1968, where 10 million workers occupied the factories in the largest
general strike in the history of Western Europe.

At that time it was only the lack of a
revolutionary leadership that saved the day for French capitalism. It
is now more urgent than ever to gather the most advanced activists in
the workers’ and youth movement in a revolutionary Marxist tendency
able to provide a leadership capable of facing up to the tasks posed
in France.

The revolutionary wave which is
sweeping Latin America is not an isolated fact, the result of
exceptional circumstances in that continent. It has obviously its
own peculiar characteristics and rhythm, but is part of a more
general malaise in society a growing anger amongst working people and
youth against the relentless erosion of the rights won by the
workers’ movement for decades, against the brutality of imperialist
war, etc … Events like those we have seen in Venezuela, in
Argentina, Ecuador, Bolivia, etc in the last decade, we will see in
the near future in Western Europe, and France is in the pole position
of countries racing to become the Venezuela of Europe.